


Singular.

by coquetteauxbasbleu



Category: Fallout 4
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-16
Updated: 2016-05-16
Packaged: 2018-06-08 20:25:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6872176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coquetteauxbasbleu/pseuds/coquetteauxbasbleu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a long slog through the rain, MacCready and Sole Survivor Madeline are confronted with a dilemma: there's only one bed at her personal retreat at the Red Rocket outside of Sanctuary.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Singular.

     The rain fell mercilessly, never slacking, never slowing. Madeline and MacCready were both soaked to the bone; Madeline’s boots were full of water, and every step she took squished as though she walked on sponges. _Just a little further_. Her mantra.  
     The trip from Diamond City back to Sanctuary had been about as miserable as any single trip Madeline had made since she’d fallen out of her cryo-pod and stumbled out of Vault 111. They should have just stayed in Diamond City, but Madeline had insisted on returning to check on the burgeoning settlement and Dogmeat.  
     MacCready suspected she was more worried about Dogmeat than anything else, but didn’t say anything. She was the Boss. And after everything she’d done for him? If she had asked him to walk to the Capitol Wasteland and back on a bed of radiated coals, he’d have done it. Not that he could say that. They hadn’t said much at all to each other, not after spilling their guts in Diamond City. After he’d told her about Lucy. After Madeline had told him she’d wanted to be more than just his boss. More than his friend. She’d shut down immediately after saying that, apologized, said she hadn’t meant to talk to him about that yet, she’d had too much to drink…but how could she take that off the table after putting it out there?  
     The thought had been circling in his head for months, but he couldn’t imagine she would have wanted him. What could he possibly offer her? He never imagined she had been thinking the same thing.  
     In the distance, the familiar spire of the Red Rocket station started to crest the horizon, and Madeline nearly collapsed with relief. She didn’t keep much there, but it was at least dry, and had a warm bed. Bed. Noun in the singular. Her heart started beating a little faster, and she swallowed as a flush rose to her olive cheeks, pale and blanched by the cold rain.  
     She had taken her glasses off hours ago (they were as worthless to her splattered with rainwater as they were in her pocket), but she still glanced sideways at MacCready’s blurred, familiar shape hunched over in the rain, his hat pulled low. He was grumbling something about being wet and that they were perfect targets on the top of the hill, and even in this miserable weather, the corners of her mouth turned up slightly.  
     Under the overhang of the Red Rocket, Madeline dropped her pack and groaned.  
     “Holy hell. If it doesn’t stop raining soon, we’re going to need to build a boat.” She sat on a couple of stacked tires and pulled off her boots, letting the water drain out of them. “Disgusting.”  
     She pulled her soaked socks off and padded gingerly across the cracked concrete. “I wonder if my Tetanus shot still counts as up-to-date after being cryogenically frozen for 200 years…” she muttered, and disappeared through the door into the station, dragging her pack along behind her.  
     MacCready followed, shedding his duster, scarf, and hat and hanging them on a nail jutting from the wall near the doorway into the garage, then leaned his rifle against the wall.  
      Bustling about, Madeline was lighting lanterns and shaking out pillows and blankets as she pulled them from a metal chest before tossing them onto the bed. She looked almost frantic, like a startled radstag doe.   
     MacCready swallowed hard, watching her. She’d tossed her armor in a corner, and her wet shirt and pants clung to her tiny frame in exactly the right places;   
     Feeling his gaze, she paused, holding a pillow. She had dried her glasses off on something, and glanced up at him over the rims of them. “There…um. I’m sorry. There’s only one bed. But it’s…it’s wide enough that I don’t think if we’re in our sleeping bags we’ll touch each other, or I’ll go sleep on the couch out in the other room, I’m so short I fit just–”  
     She had stopped just in front of him, her pale grey eyes wide. Even in the dim light, he could see how dilated her pupils were, and if he hadn’t known better, he might have thought she’d dipped into the chems. She shivered, but MacCready was sure it wasn’t because she was cold.  
     Suddenly, she stood up on her toes to place a shy, soft peck against his chin, and then another against his lips, lingering just barely longer than he thought she would. Setting back down on her heels, she looked down at the floor.  
     “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have. I wasn’t thinking. I just–”  
     “Mads…Shut up.” MacCready looked at her, standing there, dripping wet in the orangish haze cast by the lanterns she had lit. He’d never seen her get so flustered; she had a death grip on the pillow. “You don’t need to go sleep on the couch. This is your place. You’re going to sleep on the bed.” He paused, hesitant. “What you said. In Diamond City. About wanting more than…friendship. You meant it?” As he asked, he felt stupid. _She just kissed you, moron. Of course she must have meant it, right?_  
     The pillow fell from her grip. “Of course I meant it,” she whispered.  
     He ran a calloused thumb along her jawline, then leaned over to press his mouth to hers.  
     It was like she melted against him, every curve of her tiny body fitting against the hard planes of his, before she went straight like a board and backed away, snatching the pillow up off the floor and dashing out of the garage and into front of the station, her cheeks and chest flushed pink.  
     MacCready looked down at the reflective wet footprints she had left behind, glittering in the lantern light, before he sat on the edge of the bed, pulled the small wooden soldier from his pocket, and waited.


End file.
